Toxic masculinity is the lymphatic system of the Indian body politic, yet liberals only criticise it when it appears as a sore on the face and other visible body parts, never as it flows in the sinews and the underbelly, writes Akshat Jain.
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Animal is a massy revenge film with a strong universal message (so the case can be made): Work is not everything. Make time for your family. Do not be a bad father. Your paternal acts of omission and commission may have longer lasting impacts on your son’s and family’s life than you imagine.
The core of the film (so the case can be made) is a dysfunctional father-son relationship and how toxic it can get for everyone around them if it is not addressed and redressed.
The film starts with a son being wronged by his father and ends with that father apologising. Everything else (all the violence, drama and sex) is entertainment to join the dots between those two points. The nature of the entertainment (so the case can be made) merely reflects what Indian audiences will pay money to see.
The OG Vijay
Animal is really an update on Ramesh Sippy’s Shakti (released in 1982), written by the doyens of ‘toxic masculinity’ of their times, Salim Khan and Javed Akhtar.
In that film, a police officer (played by Dilip Kumar) neglects his son (Amitabh Bachchan as Vijay) because of his duty towards the law; the son becomes a criminal, kills the villain (Amrish Puri) and in the end, the father and son reconcile and express their undying love for each other.
The core of the film is a dysfunctional father-son relationship and how toxic it can get for everyone around them if it is not addressed and redressed.
In 2023, a businessman (played by Anil Kapoor) neglects his son (Ranbir Kapoor also as Vijay) because of his duty towards the business (and nation building, or so they say); the son becomes a criminal, kills the villain (Bobby Deol) and in the end the father and son reconcile and everybody cries in everybody’s arms (strong men also cry!).
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The men in Shakti are every bit as toxic as the men in Animal. The women are as much appendages to their alpha males, who give their women orders, slap them when the need arises but will do anything to protect them from others, and who beat down scores and scores of men by themselves for no reason other than to show that they can.
This is just to point out that Animal is not a new beast on India’s cinescape, it is deeply entrenched in India’s culture and its film tradition. It is the toxic and regressive angry young man trope created by Salim–Javed that Ranbir Kapoor picks up in Animal.
If it is argued that Amitabh Bachchan’s Vijay represented the reality of the young man of his time, then it is fairly easy to argue that Ranbir Kapoor’s Vijay represents the reality of the young man of our times. What do we expect Vijay to be but this? Should he have been an Ambedkarite feminist?
What separates the two movies is their aesthetic and a few cosmetic choices, which are merely a function of their times. In Shakti, made in socialist India, businessmen are absent (they are all just smugglers and criminals). In Animal, made in capitalist India, the police are absent (there are only private security guards).
Concomitantly, in Shakti, masculinity is not glamorised like it has been in Animal. Masculinity becomes toxic in Shakti due to a conflict between the police officer’s duty as a public official and his responsibilities as a father in the private sphere of his family. Both father and son end up paying the price of this conflict and lose everything they hold dear by the end of the film.
The men in Shakti are every bit as toxic as the men in Animal.
In Animal, there is no such conflict between the public and the private. Masculinity becomes toxic due to a property conflict within the family. There is not a hint of public duty or public consciousness. The public sphere has in fact been completely subsumed by the private, with the family saga playing out all over the world with not a single instance of State intervention at any time.
While there is an end to the conflict in Shakti, as the private family is sacrificed to public duty, the conflict in Animal is never-ending. With the complete absence of the justice system, the blood feud never ends. After Ranbir Kapoor kills Bobby Deol and ends this particular film, a sequel is born as Bobby Deol’s younger brother vows revenge.
Emasculation and hyper-masculinity in capitalist society
Under conditions of capitalism, we are constantly pressured to be more and more successful, to keep moving up the metaphorical ladder. We have to keep improving our lives and keep amassing more and more wealth and power. Everything in life is a competition to be won. But the very nature of this competition is that only a few will win while the majority will be losers.
Also read: The schizophrenia that is Pathaan
Contrary to the myth that associates capitalism with freedom and equality, it has become fairly clear that wealth and power are being concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. Only the winners are free in any meaningful sense while the rest end up selling their freedom for the ‘right to survive’.
Since our culture expects men to protect and provide the best for the families, the actual loss of power, wealth and freedom in this system emasculates them. The feeling of emasculation has been increasing with rising inequality and ever greater loss of control over their life circumstances. For such emasculated men, hyper-masculinity and associated violence are born as compensatory mechanisms.
Further, as women leave behind traditional gender roles and enter the market, there is very little to separate the emasculated men from women. They seem to be doing the same jobs and fulfilling the same roles both in the public and private spheres. Misogyny can thus be seen as an attempt by these men to separate themselves from women.
In Shakti, made in socialist India, businessmen are absent (they are all just smugglers and criminals). In Animal, made in capitalist India, the police are absent (there are only private security guards).
Two things can be seen here. On one hand, men differentiate themselves by signalling masculinity through violence. On the other hand, they differentiate women by pushing them back into traditional gender roles.
What is referred to as toxic masculinity is a combination of these two. That this toxic masculinity is not marginal but deeply embedded in our culture as can be seen by its pervasiveness in central institutions of our society like the judicial system.
Toxic masculinity and misogyny in India’s courts
Our courts regularly seem to be reinforcing traditional gender roles for women. Ranbir Kapoor’s dialogue about women staying at home in ancient times and choosing alpha males for protection could very well have been said by a judge.
In 2012, while hearing a divorce petition, a division Bench of the Bombay High Court comprising Justice P.B. Majmudar and Anoop Mohta observed that “A wife should be like goddess Sita.” What they meant to assert was that a woman should leave her job if need be to follow her husband wherever he goes.
In 2013, judges of the Kerala High Court said that, “The reasons advanced by the lower court even by quoting a Sanskrit slogan alleged to have been borrowed from the petitioner that ‘wife should be minister in purpose, slave in duty, Lakshmi in appearance, Earth in patience, mother in love and prostitute in bed’ would itself show the manner in which the lower court misappreciated the evidence involved in the case.”
The Kerala High Court, in Hadiya’s case, remarked that “A girl aged 24 years is weak and vulnerable, capable of being exploited in many ways.” According to the judges, these girls should thus decide whom they marry only after active discussions with their parents.
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In 2011, while hearing a habeas corpus petition filed by a 21-year-old man who had alleged that the girl he married was missing, a Karnataka High Court Bench comprising Justice Bhakthavatsala and Justice Govindaraju ordered the registration of a case of kidnapping against the youth.
In the opinion of the judges, “Girls below the age of 21 years are not capable of forming a rational judgement as to suitability of the boy.” Therefore, “In the case of a love affair of a girl, who is below the age of 21 years, there shall be a condition that the parents of the girl should approve the marriage, otherwise such marriages should be declared void or voidable.”
In 2012, the same Justice K. Bhakthavatsala is reported to have said in court that it was acceptable for a man to beat his wife as long as he took good care of her.
The public sphere has in fact been completely subsumed by the private, with the family saga playing out all over the world with not a single instance of State intervention at any time.
Not only are women treated as intellectually inferior to men and encouraged to accept the authority of men, violence against women is also explained away by their taking too many liberties. It is almost as if the judges are saying, if women do not behave like ‘good women’, what else can they expect but violence from men?
In a recent judgment, in a matter of rape of an adolescent, the honourable judges of the Calcutta High Court observed, among other things, that “it is the duty or obligation of every female adolescent to … control sexual urges as in the eyes of the society she is the loser when she gives in to enjoy the sexual pleasure of hardly two minutes.”
While a Bench of the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dr D.Y. Chandrachud took suo motu cognisance against the remarks made by the high court and noted that such observations were objectionable and unwarranted, such remarks are neither new nor rare.
In 2016, a Supreme Court Bench comprising Justices Pinaki Chandra Ghosh and Amitava Roy acquitted rape convicts saying that the woman’s “conduct during the alleged ordeal is also unlike a victim of forcible rape and betrays [a] somewhat submissive and consensual disposition”.
In 2018, the Punjab and Haryana High Court suspended the sentences of three students by a trial court for the rape of another student on the basis of the victim’s “misadventures and experiments”, her “promiscuity” and the absence of brutal violence accompanying the sexual assault.
Also read: Indira Jaising writes to the CJI on subtleties of gender stereotyping, suggests combat measures
In June 2020, while granting anticipatory bail to an accused, a Karnataka High Court judge, Justice Krishna S. Dixit, observed that it is unbecoming of Indian women to go to sleep after being raped.
It is presumably in acknowledgement of such blatant misogyny in India’s courts that the Supreme court launched a handbook earlier this year to combat gender stereotypes.
One big reason for this pervasive toxic masculinity is the severe and scandalous underrepresentation of women in India’s justice system. The first woman judge, Justice Fathima Beevi, was appointed 40 years after the establishment of the Supreme Court. Till today, a woman has not become the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.
“A wife should be minister in purpose, slave in duty, Lakshmi in appearance, Earth in patience, mother in love and prostitute in bed,” said a court in Kerala.
Women not only face challenges in entering the profession but these male-dominated spaces are not welcome for them even after they do manage to make it.
On April 19, 2019, in a sworn affidavit submitted to 22 sitting Supreme Court judges, a former Supreme Court employee accused the serving CJI Ranjan Gogoi of sexually harassing her and then later sabotaging her career and harassing her family when she refused his advances.
Reportedly, “Gogoi then chaired a hearing to address the accusations against himself, a grossly unethical move the other justices should have disparaged.
“Instead, they stood in solidarity with him, backed him in his claim that the woman is out to dismantle and discredit the Indian judicial system, and now seem to be launching full throttle in the opposite direction than they were supposed to move toward, asking that no women should work for them.”
Human Rights lawyer Kiruba Munusamy writes in an article, “A judge in Madras High Court once passed a comment on my short haircut. I protested but other male lawyers made me apologise. This is what women lawyers face.”
Indira Jaising, the first woman additional solicitor general, wrote an open letter to the CJI on International Women’s Day in 2019 to address the rampant sexism in India’s courts. Among other things, she said, “Just as language echoes the times and culture of the period, it also has the power to influence the thoughts of a nation and mould the culture of a society.”
It can be argued that the language used in the Indian judicial system, an institution that is responsible for setting legal standards of conduct in society, has enormous influence on the rest of society. Given the examples cited above, films like Animal seem to be reflecting the state of our society fairly well.
Fans versus liberal critics of Animal
Fans and critics of Vanga films always seem to be talking at cross purposes.
In June 2020, while granting anticipatory bail to an accused, a Karnataka High Court judge, Justice Krishna S. Dixit, observed that it is unbecoming of Indian women to go to sleep after being raped.
Critics seem to exclusively be focussing on the gratuitous gore and toxic masculinity in Animal, with one critic calling it a “pointless, vile tale”.
Fans seem to think that the film has important things to say, that it delivers “a raw and unfiltered portrait of reality”.
One fan tweet reads: “Sandeep Reddy Vanga narrated a saga which has substance, violence, emotions and powerful drama.”
In the cases of Arjun Reddy and Kabir Singh as well, this same divorce could be observed between overwhelming acceptance by the audience (given their Box Office numbers) and almost a complete rejection by critics.
Film Companion did a piece on why fans love those two films even though critics were almost universally panning it. Apart from the fact that the films are entertaining and their protagonists cool (not such bad reasons to enjoy a film), the most overwhelming response was that people could relate to the characters, that the characters felt real.
Many fans pointed out that while the relationships shown might have been toxic, they were a much more accurate depiction of real-life relationships than is “shown in conventional romantic films”.
I want to point out that the mindless violence and toxic masculinity of Vanga’s characters also reflects the state of our society better than the idealistic violence of conventional action films like Jawan.
The massy revenge film both fans and liberal film critics liked
Jawan too sends out a strong, albeit non-universal, message (so the case can be made): Think about who you vote for. Do not vote for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Human Rights lawyer Kiruba Munusamy writes in an article, “A judge in Madras High Court once passed a comment on my short haircut. I protested but other male lawyers made me apologise. This is what women lawyers face.”
This strong message comes packaged in toxic nationalism: a nationalism which justifies violence through xenophobic populist rhetoric (the barbaric Chinese army and generic Muslim terrorists) and uses hero-worship (of an army officer and jailer) to absolve the army and the Indian State of their crimes.
Also read: Supreme Court to hear petitions challenging marital rape exception in Indian Penal Code
While critics cannot seem to digest the toxic masculinity of Animal, they seem to have not had too much of an issue with the toxic nationalism of Jawan. In fact, there was barely a mainstream review that even mentioned that Jawan celebrated toxic nationalism; they were all too busy singing paeans to the film.
It can be argued that even misogyny, one of the central problems critics have with Animal, was ignored by critics when it happened in Jawan. Why do the women stand around as the men fight? Why are the women treated as expendable appendages in the father-son revenge tale, with no narrative arcs of their own?
Critics have excused this toxic nationalistic packaging (and misogyny) by saying that it was necessary in today’s fraught political environment. Without this packaging, the film could not have seen the light of day and the message of the film could not have reached the number of ears it did. In short, ends justify means.
Can this justification or ‘excuse’ not work for Animal? Given the business that Kabir Singh did and Animal is doing, it is clear that violence, drama and toxic masculinity sell. Would it have been possible to reach so many people with the message that their faults as fathers have effects on their children’s mental wellbeing without this packaging?
If the toxic nationalism of Jawan was worth the anti-BJP message, why is the toxic masculinity of Animal not worth the treat-your-children-well message? If one argues that Animal fails at delivering that message, then it can easily be argued that Jawan also fails at its job, especially given the results of the first state elections that happened after the release of the film.
Vanga’s victory over his liberal critics
If, as has been argued, Animal is Vanga’s answer to critics, I think he has succeeded beyond even what he thought possible. He has exposed the hypocrisy and double standards of his critics (as Ram Gopal Verma might say) and thus made their criticisms impotent. Despite their efforts to not rise to the bait, cultural critics have managed to fall into his trap.
Also read: The Devil’s Dictionary of Gender and Law
What Vanga has shown is this: The politics and figure of Shah Rukh Khan are to their liking so cultural critics are ready to excuse all the excesses in his film in the name of artistic freedom and political necessity. The only reason they rail against Animal so much is because Vanga does not pander to them and they personally hate his guts.
Many fans pointed out that while the relationships shown might have been toxic, they were a much more accurate depiction of real-life relationships than is “shown in conventional romantic films”.
The criticism of Vanga’s movies is not film criticism at all but merely critics being angry with the director and signalling their own moral righteousness. If the criticism was done objectively, then Jawan should not have received such a divergent treatment from Animal.
If they were objective, then the critics would have called Jawan a self-aggrandizing project too. They would have called it a boring, mindless, over-the-top melodramatic movie made by Shah Rukh Khan to silence his own critics. A needlessly violent saga that is xenophobic, misogynistic and promotes colonialism (what else can nationalism for a colonial power amount to?).
Vanga’s film might be misogynistic, but it can be argued that it is more entertaining than Jawan, less Islamophobic than Jawan (Muslims are not terrorists but the same kind of violent businessmen as the Sikhs and Hindus), less bigoted than Jawan (the unrealistically barbaric Chinese army come to destroy a generic village in the northeast), and does not promote colonialism (read: nationalism) with the same fervour as Jawan does.
While Jawan is so self-righteous and serious about its nationalism that there is nary a joke or an ironic dialogue about it, Animal even manages an honest-to-God ironic take on nationalism with its Made-in-India supergun.
Also read: Unmasking the misogyny of Indian Courts
Finally, if Animal’s toxic masculinity produces such strong negative reactions in these critics, why does Jawan’s toxic nationalism not produce the same kind of reaction? Is one to believe that they are okay with toxic nationalism and the violence it implies? Is toxic masculinity really so much bigger of a problem than toxic nationalism?
The problem (one of the many) with liberals in India today
With the BJP winning elections in the states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, it is time for yet another round of introspection for India’s liberals. They just cannot seem to find their footing. It is clear that they are not able to get to the masses. There is a clear divorce between them and voters, just like the divorce between film critics and filmgoers.
The hypocrisy of liberals has much to do with this (hate to agree with Kangana Ranaut but she is right when she is right). They act like they are being objective but they really are not. As film critics, they are letting their subjective likes and dislikes take over. And in politics, they are letting their private interests take over.
The upper hand is given to Vanga and the BJP because they are not acting hypocritically. They are unapologetically consistent about themselves and what they want. They do not pretend to be objective. Their fans and voters appreciate that.
While Jawan is so self-righteous and serious about its nationalism that there is nary a joke or an ironic dialogue about it, Animal even manages an honest-to-God ironic take on nationalism with its Made-in-India supergun.
If you hate Animal, then be honest enough to also hate Jawan. Conversely, if you love Jawan, then do not hate on Animal.
Similarly, if you hate the BJP, then be honest enough to also hate the Congress. Conversely, if you love the Congress, then do not hate the BJP.
Liberals must learn that they cannot have their cake and eat it too. You cannot criticise the BJP on Kashmir but be okay with what Congress has done and will do if it ever gets the chance again. You cannot criticise Animal for toxic masculinity but be okay with the toxic nationalism of Jawan.
That is called bad faith and that is the diagnosis the liberal reaction to Animal leaves us with. People will not vote for you if they cannot trust your word.
